Family Portraits...

I lurve family studio portraits. What's so great abt it is that the whole family get to go through the process of posing and making a fool of ourselves. Although the end result normally turns out all nice and dandy, only those people in the studio know wat kind of "torture" we had to go thru.

This Klassen studio portrait was taken just weeks ago after Sherman's and Shawn's ROM. At one glance, the picture looks allrite. But bet you didnt know this:
(1) Shawn, my sis-in-law, is actually quite short. But in the pic, she looked as if she is just abt the same height as me. Why?? Simply cos she's standing on a box. The photographer that day was a bit goondu. He put Shawn on a box but I ended up looking shorter than her. So I cried out and said, "Shawn can't be taller than me. We must be abt the same height at least!". Looking as blur as ever, he then went to give me a thick phonebook for me to stand on. See, so much better. Otherwise, the pic would look so wrong..
(2) The photographer had to change the background colour THREE times. Why? Cos the other colours just seem to blend in too much with my brown top. It was So embarrasing for me!
(3) The photographer is so slow! He'll be telling us "Ready!" and there'll be abt a 10 seconds wait before he clicked. By the time he captured the picture, all of our eyes were already closed. Sherman, Kirk and I were the major culprits.
(4) Mum and Dad were initially told to sit on a bench....and the picture turned out alrite, I believe. But, for no apparent reason, the photographer told them to stand up and replaced the bench with 2 odd-looking boxes which are piled with several telephone books. Well dun ask me why he does that! The pile seems to be just as high as the bench and seriously, I dun see any difference in its end result.
(5) All of us switched places at least once. The photograher simply can't make up his goddamn mind. Well, he is old and very super blur.

This next picture was taken in September 2004 after my Uni graduation. First ever studio portrait we've ever done as a family. The shoot was funny as hell cos its done by this young photographer who had so much energy in him. He was simply so hyper abt everything. And also, several things happened:
(1) My mum brought two outfits for this photo shoot. But, she was coerced by the make-up artist to wear this red dress instead.
(2) My youngest bro had to go through a few experiments with the photographer as to whether he should keep his spectacles on or not. He had to try different types of smiles and hand positions too. He suffered the most that day although it was supposed to be MY day of torture.
(3) The photographer had to coax my dad sooooooooooooo many times to smile more. Well, look at the picture....that was as far as he could go for. Not surprising cos my dad's known to be serious.

Then, I told the photographer that I wanted to try sumthing different. Sumthing that's a bit out of the ordinary and more relaxed. Well, I lurved the end result. No regrets asking the photographer to do this shot.
(1) It cracked the family up initially when the photographer told my dad to put his hand on my shoulder and me to put my elbow on my dad's knee. It's like so weird then. Period.
(2) My brother, Khai, was the super relaxed one that day. He doesn't need to be given repeated instructions to do this or that. He seems to be in his element and almost always give the pose that the photographer wants.
(3) My mum had ALOT of trouble balancing herself on the small, square stool which explains the cheeky grin on her face.
(4) My youngest bro, Shafiq, was told to remove his spectacles for this shot. He, however, much preferred having his spectacles on. This explains his fake smile.